Barnett: CU should bring in outside help

Former Buffs coach suggests Cal, Wisconsin could aid officials

Gary Barnett has a plan that could help save Colorado's football program. He knows. It helped save his.

The last coach to lead Colorado to a winning record said the school should bring in a panel of experts from a school that also hit rock bottom. They should be invited in, examine everything and report their suggestions. Then CU should act.

"You can't continue doing what you're doing and think it's the right thing to do," Barnett said Thursday in a phone interview. "It doesn't work. It hasn't worked."

Barnett's advice comes after a school-record seventh consecutive losing season in which Jon Embree was fired after only two years and a 4-21 record, including this year's school-worst 1-11.

Barnett said athletic director Mike Bohn and chancellor Phil DiStefano should bring in a well-respected former coach and one or two athletic administrators to examine in detail what Colorado is doing wrong and suggest how they can do it right.

"You need somebody to objectively tell you what it is that you need to change," Barnett said. "Then it's up to you to decide to do it or not. I think part of that is to swallow your ego and say, 'Look, something's not working and we're all involved in this, so how do we change it?'

"Why reinvent the wheel? Why take three or four years or more to figure this out? Why not figure out how it's been done in the past in situations like ours?"

Barnett cited two examples: California and Wisconsin.

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Before it hired Jeff Tedford, then Oregon's offensive coordinator, Cal had eight consecutive non-winning seasons, including an 0-11 goose egg in 1999 and a 1-10 record in 2001. Facilities were among the worst in the league. Memorial Stadium had massive sections of empty seats.

After Tedford's hiring, Cal had eight consecutive winning seasons and a massive renovation was completed at Memorial Stadium this year. Cal recently fired Tedford after a 3-9 mark, but obviously it did something right besides hiring the right coach. Tedford, not ironically, has been mentioned as a candidate to replace Embree.

"CU wants to constantly throw themselves up as the same type of school and atmosphere and standard," Barnett said. "That's a perfect example."

Wisconsin went 6-27 under Don Morton from 1987-89. It then hired Barry Alvarez, Notre Dame's defensive coordinator. He went 10-1-1 in his fourth year and made three Rose Bowls. Wisconsin, to this day, continues to be a top-tier Big Ten program.

Wisconsin officials could offer some sage advice.

"If you're going to do that, you've got to be willing to hear what you're going to hear," Barnett said. "You're not going to like what you're going to hear, OK? So if you put yourself out there like that, you've got to be willing to hear things like there's no communication. There's not communication here, here, there, there, wherever.

"It's going to be somewhat of an indictment of you and some of the people in your program."

Barnett knows from experience. He won't say what year it was, other than it was after a season full of an unusual number of injuries. He brought in an ex-trainer, an ex-strength coach and Dick Tomey, former head coach of Hawaii and Arizona, to look at his program.

"I gave them access to everybody for three or four or five days," Barnett said. "They talked to everybody in our football program. They talked to coaches, talked to our trainers. They talked to our strength people. They talked to our athletes. They talked to everybody.

"Then they gave me a report and I used that report."

Asked how much it helped, Barnett said: "a lot."

The self-critique likely occurred after 2000, his second year, when the Buffs went 3-8 and the team had a high number of injuries. The following season Colorado went 10-3 and won the Big 12 title. Barnett had winning seasons three of his next four years before being fired after losing to Texas, 70-3, in the 2005 Big 12 championship game.

How desperate is Colorado to consult outside sources? Since Embree's firing, Bohn said he has received $750,000 in donations. However, the school continues to pay millions to coaches it fired.

"It's as rock bottom as it's ever been," Barnett said. "The only thing I'd tell you is there are better players there now than (Bill McCartney) had going into the '85 season (7-5). There's enough to start fighting back with."

Barnett, now a TV analyst, said Bohn should not have fired Embree after two seasons.

"They should've followed through with (Embree's) plan," Barnett said. "Let him make the (staff) changes he was going to make. You knew what you were getting with Jon. If you don't let him see through his plan, then this should be blamed on the administration, not on Jon Embree."

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